


Pyrolysis

by LitLocked



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: M/M, Pining!Sherlock, Sherlock introspects
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-29
Updated: 2014-06-29
Packaged: 2018-02-06 17:50:18
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 604
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1866924
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LitLocked/pseuds/LitLocked
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock and fire.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pyrolysis

**Author's Note:**

> The first line is of course the first line of Douglas Adams' The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Needless to say, don't expect the succeeding lines of this fic to have any of his brilliance.

_“In the beginning, the universe was created.”_

His mind goes off on another tangent, and he shuts the book he had lifted from John’s collection.

Only Sherlock Holmes could be arrogant enough to compare his emotional state to the evolution of the earth. But then only the scorching bubbling turmoil of the earth came close to the way his insides felt.

***

His arrival anywhere is like a bang: the explosion that launches shards everywhere. Shards that nest themselves in the hearts of everyone who comes into contact with him. His birth had been no different. The ball of fire blazed for years, scalding everyone who came in its orbit. A well-dressed conflagration that deduced at top speed.

Fire _is_ his essence: ruthless, inconsiderate, rips through everything until only the bare bones remain. Untameable, intense, ferocious. A force of nature. 

***

Early on, he had realized that he couldn’t come too close to anything without burning them. Even Redbeard, whom he had loved as much as it was possible for him to love anyone.

But the setter had got burnt during one his unusually explosive experiments, and had been in so much pain that he had to be put down.

The drugs had dulled the pain for a while; only to make reality even more scathingly raw when he came down. He learnt to replace the scorching heat of his fire with the indifference of ice. Given a choice between searing pain born of caring too much and freezing himself in a vault of never caring again, he chose the latter.

***

Until John Watson walked into his life.

John, who thawed him where he was too cold, and steadied him where he threatened to run out of control. There were always eruptions and landslides; the crust over his inner inferno was thin after all. But John didn’t mind. Much. Around John, Sherlock was able to let off steam without exploding or imploding. John sheltered him from the tiresome world without making him wish he could lock himself out.

***

 _I will burn the heart out of you_. And Sherlock had had to revert to his natural state to set Moriarty’s network ablaze.

From the ashes of Reichenbach he had emerged bruised, singed, scarred but alive. It had to be a unique kind of fire: that burnt the unleasher as much as those it was unleashed upon.

***

Back in London, back in John’s presence, Sherlock couldn’t comprehend what had changed. And then, it dawned on him.

He should’ve foreseen that he’d see John in a bonfire. His mind kept flashing back to Redbeard. _Mea culpa, mea culpa_. He had to engulf everything and everyone he loved into flames, didn’t he?

Mercifully, John was just singed.  _Amazing, how fire exposes our priorities._

***

Fire isn’t the only thing that burns. And burning isn’t the only thing that it does.

John had brought along his fire, his ability to illuminate everything Sherlock did. _My conductor of light._ But John’s fire had done something more than mere illumination: it branded Sherlock. Cauterized _John’s detective_ into his skin.

And then he left. For Mary.

***

Sherlock wasn’t the only one who was broken; John had plastered over so much with ice too. He was just better at controlling it; while Sherlock’s always threatened to spin out of control. No John meant no barricades.

No wonder 221B was now a museum of the smouldering remains of Sherlock-post-John.

***

He did not want to be the black hole that sucked John’s fragile happiness into himself, so he’s content with burning like a distant star so that John can stay warm.

Oh but he burns. How he burns.

 


End file.
